Another mid-August holiday
Paolo Virzì
The “in itself” sequel to a film that has become a generational, social and political cult? A big risk, yes. But Virzì’s return to Ventotene, cloaked in the melancholy brought by age, has an uncommon vitality. And again the sharp eye on the present, between neo-fascists and influencers. The protagonists of that time, now wrinkled by life, are splendid (Orlando, Morante, Ferilli & C.) and the new entries are excellent (De Sica, Marchioni, Ferraioli Ravel, Carpenzano, Fanelli). Little understood by the public (and by many critics).
Second film after almost ten years (The wait era from 2015), Piero Messina takes a Solinas-winning subject and turns it into a very interesting “glocal” work. Maintaining a typically Italian artisanal taste, this dystopia set in a non-place in Europe and with a great international cast (Gael García Bernal, Renate Reinsve, Bérénice Bejo) knows how to tune in to the “sentiment” of our time, between solitudes and elaborations of mourning that concern us all. A totally undeserved box office flop.
The damned
Roberto Minervini
The author – the Italian-in-America creator of instant classic of the cinema of reality as Louisiana And What to do when the world is on fire? – called it a “creation documentary”. And in fact Roberto Minervini’s first fiction film, awarded for direction in the Un certain regard section of the last Cannes, seems to be “being made” before our eyes. Frontier soldiers during the American Civil War echo today’s political and private conflicts. And they make one of the most significant filmmakers we can boast on a global scale take a (perhaps) new direction.
Ambitious, arrogant, excessive. Pietro Castellitto’s second work afterwards The predators it is another fresco from Rome (North) which consecrates his voice as an author (see also the novel The Hyperboreans, released between one film and another). Another overflowing ensemble (feat. Benedetta Porcaroli, Castellitto senior and the discovery Giorgio Quarzo Guarascio aka Tutti Fenomeni) to tell the loss of a generation, which is basically the same as those that preceded it. In competition in Venice 2023: those who criticized the choice of director Barbera are because he does not look further ahead, like him, towards the (already present) future of our art scene.
Glory!
Margherita Vicario
“We play for glory, history is not made here”, sings Margherita in the song Air! which accompanies the closing credits of his directorial debut. The idea is very real: the 18th century orphans who became composers but were “submerged” as women. The result, however, is a feelgoodmovie feminist, yes, but without proclamations, innervated by the joy of writing, today, a page of cinema and music that can chart a new course. A “gang” of perfect faces (Galatéa Bellugi, Carlotta Gamba, Veronica Lucchesi of La Representative di Lista) for a free and vital story. In competition at the last Berlinale.
Me and Secco
Gianluca Santoni
Another round, another first work. Gianluca Santoni signs yet another parable indie “on the outskirts of Rome”, but gives it an unusual fairy-tale touch. A ten-year-old boy is tired of seeing his mother mistreated by his father, and so he decides to hire a killer to kill him. Nice secondary participations (from Barbara Ronchi to Andrea Sartoretti), but the one who steals the show is “il Secco” of the title, that is Andrea Lattanzi, one of the most “growing” faces of our cinema. We await the second work.
That summer with Irène
Carlo Sironi
Consecrated, after many short films, by the first feature film (Sun, 2019), Carlo Sironi returns with a female-oriented work that focuses on two girls (the notable Noée Abita and Maria Camilla Brandenburg) caught in a summer of the late 1990s in the hospital that is treating them. Among many teen drama on the theme of illness in recent years, this one stands out for its total anti-rhetoric: the portrait of the two protagonists is extremely delicate, something rarely seen in our cinema. This too was presented at the last Berlin Film Festival.
I told you
Geneva Elkann
After making a name for itself, in full lockdown, with a good debut Let’s hope, Ginevra Elkann – already a producer and distributor, as well as a cinephile capable of putting her passion into everything she does – returns with a film that raises the bar of ambition, set in a very hot Rome where everyone is alone, selfish, fleeing from others and from themselves. The cast is wild (Golino, Bruni Tedeschi, Rohrwacher, Scamarcio, plus theinternational” Danny Huston and Greta Scacchi), the increasingly sure hand, the lucid and original look. This is also generally misunderstood.
Too blue
Filippo Barbagallo
He makes many debuts this year, the lightest, and yet capable of touching the deep (and often incomprehensible, at least by the “boomers”) chords of Gen Z, is that of Filippo Barbagallo. Between the first Nanni Moretti and Gianni Di Gregorio (who here acts as supervisor creative), the story of “one boy, two girls” (the director himself and the talented Alice Benvenuti and Martina Gatti) in Rome in August traces a new existential-sentimental map in our cinema. And it makes you feel good (also thanks to Pop X’s music). What more could you want from a first work?
Among the many actors who moved behind the camera in the last season, perhaps the least understood “leap” is that of Margherita Buy. She who creates a sort of autofiction in a French comedy “for adults” that mixes neuroses, fears (of flying first and foremost), inadequacies, but also a desire for contagious tenderness. A nice cast of supporting characters (special mention for Elena Sofia Ricci as herself) for a portrait of a mature woman between Call My Agent and, here too, “his” Nanni. Marco Bellocchio produces.
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